Intimacy intimacy has helped displace civic and commu-

nity engagement, that individualized forms of

LYNN JAMIESON intimacy have undermined conventional “family
values,” and counterclaims of heightened equality
and democracy spreading from personal life to
What is imagined by “intimacy” as a quality of other domains.
relationships is often associated with particular “Self-disclosing intimacy” as an element of
ways of behaving (Davis 1973). Intimacy is some- “good” couple, family, and, ultimately, friendship
times defined narrowly to mean the familiarity relationships has had widespread endorsement
resulting from close association. In this sense, among the growing ranks of relationship experts,
domestic life across much of the life course in psychologists, psychiatrists, psychotherapists,
all societies is intimate. Living arrangements and sexual counselors. This viewpoint was
that involve sharing domestic space, a “hearth increasingly marketed and advertised in the
and home,” the caring activities associated with late twentieth century through a range of cul-
bearing and raising children, and other forms tural products advocating talking and listening,
of routinely giving or receiving physical care sharing your thoughts, showing your feelings
necessarily provide familiarity and privileged to achieve and maintain a “good relationship,”
knowledge. Sometimes the term “intimacy” is often privileging self-expression over more prac-
also used even more narrowly to refer to sexual tical forms of “love and care.” Advocates of
familiarity with another person. In everyday “self-disclosing intimacy” claim participants in
current usage, intimacy is often presumed to conversations of mutual self-revelation create
involve more than close association and familiar- a quality of relationship more intense than the
ity, for example, also involving strong emotional knowing and understanding that can be gathered
attachments such as love. However, in both pop- without such dialogue. Sexual intimacy may play
ular and academic commentaries, intimacy is a part, but for some advocates of this type of
increasingly understood as representing a very intimacy it is neither a necessary nor a suffi-
particular form of “closeness” and being “special” cient condition, as an intimacy of inner selves
to another person founded on self-disclosure. is conceived as possible without an intimacy
This self-disclosing or self-expressing intimacy is of bodies. However, if, as some theorists have
characterized by knowledge and understanding argued, sexuality has come to be seen in western
of inner selves. Privileged knowledge gained cultures as expressive of the very essence of the
through close physical association is not a suffi- self, then sexual familiarity inevitably enhances
cient condition to ensure this type of intimacy. the intimacy generated by verbal self-disclosures.
People living side by side can feel trapped together Academics across a range of disciplines have
as strangers who know nothing of each other’s provided metacommentary on this cultural turn
inner worlds. to “self-disclosing intimacy,” generating both
Studying how people generate and sustain pessimistic and optimistic analysis of changes in
intimacy leaves open the issue of what types of intimate relationships. An influential optimistic
intimate relationships (sexual relationships, cou- analysis was produced by British sociologist
ple, kin, specific family relationships, friendship) Anthony Giddens in The Transformation of Inti-
are significant to people in different times and macy (1992). Giddens argued that a qualitative
places. Popular and academic commentators shift in intimacy began to occur in the late
of trends in affluent “western” societies make twentieth century. In this period, the faster pace
a range of claims and counterclaims about the of social change and heightened awareness of
nature of intimacy, its meaning and significance risk and uncertainty meant that conventional
in everyday lives, and patterns of social change. ways of doing things, including “being a family”
These include claims that a focus on private and constructing gender and sexual identities,

The Blackwell Encyclopedia of Sociology. Edited by George Ritzer.

© 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Published 2007 by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
DOI: 10.1002/9781405165518.wbeosi071
2 INTIMACY

were increasingly open to reworking, as people number of instances of people constructing inti-
became more self-conscious of being makers of mate relationships outside of the “heteronorm”
their own “narrative-of-the-self.” In this climate, (Roseneil & Budgeon 2004).
Giddens argued, people increasingly sought Whereas Giddens’s account suggested that
“self-disclosing intimacy” to anchor themselves cultural emphasis on “disclosing intimacy” is
in one or more particularly intense personal matched by positive social change in the every-
relationships. Relationships became more fragile, day lives of men and women, there are many
only lasting as long as they provided mutual more pessimistic visions of what is happening
satisfaction, but they were also potentially more to intimacy in this period of “postmodernity.”
satisfactory, equal, and democratic. Sex was no According to a number of academic commen-
longer harnessed to set scripts; instead couples tators, either intimacy has become attenuated
negotiated their own rules of sexual conduct (rather than more intense) or its intensity is of lit-
on a “what-we-enjoy” basis. Although people tle social worth. Unrestrained market forces and
continued to choose long-term intimate rela- mass consumer cultures are accused of promot-
tionships, including marriage-like relationships ing a self-obsessive, self-isolating, or competitive
and parenting relationships, diversity in styles of individualism which renders people incapable of
personal life inevitably also blossomed. sustaining meaningful intimate relationships. As
There has been continued discussion of whether one commentator puts it, concern to be sincere
and why women’s relationships appear to involve and responsible is replaced with worry about
more “self-disclosing intimacy” than men’s being true to one’s self (Misztal 2000). Social
(Duncombe & Marsden 1995). Some psycho- scientists from a range of contexts have devel-
logical and psychoanalytic accounts map this oped variations of this argument, sometimes
to the function of mothering and mother–child in tandem with debate about “social capital”
relationships. Historically produced gendered and concern that private intimacy supplants or
cultural discourses, together with inequalities undermines “community.” Well-known examples
in social constraints and opportunities, are also include Bauman (2003) and Sennett (1998). This
widely cited in the literature. Similarly, there are is also a longstanding subtheme in the work of
discussions of differences by social class, ethnicity, Hochschild (2003; see also Bellah et al. 1985).
age, and life course stage in patterns of intimacy. High rates of relationship breakdown, the
Giddens suggested that women, and particularly associated disruption of wider social networks,
lesbians and young women, were at the vanguard and concerns, particularly in Europe and North
of his alleged transformation of intimacy: women America, about juggling family and work clearly
because previous conventions and social con- do indicate strains in intimate life. However,
ditions have made them more skilled at “doing detailed research on how people conduct specific
intimacy”; women in same-sex relationships intimate relationships commonly identifies stren-
because they are less constrained by any prior uous efforts to create “good relationships” and to
script that suggests a particular division of labor; put children and “family” first, although generally
and young women because they have the most to it is women who continue to play the larger part
gain in more equal and democratic relationships. in sustaining these intimate relationships. Much
The work of some feminist commentators has of the empirical research demonstrates neither
suggested that Giddens has underestimated the self-obsession nor the primacy of “self-disclosing
persistence of gender inequality (Jamieson 1999) intimacy.” In a review of research on couple
and the ideological strength of a conventional relationships, sexual relationships, parent–child
heterosexual culture (Berlant 1997). Berlant relationships, and friendship relationships,
argued in her analysis of US culture that the ide- Jamieson (1998) concluded that the evidence
ologies and institutions of heterosexual intimacy demonstrated a wider repertoire of intimacy
have provided support to a reactionary status quo than “disclosing intimacy.” The relationships
by encouraging citizens to take refuge from the people described as “good” relationships were
confusions of capitalism and politics. However, often neither equal nor democratic. Moreover,
Giddens’s argument also finds support among equal relationships were sustained by more than
those who believe they are identifying a growing “disclosing intimacy.” For example, couples who
 INTIMACY 3

had worked hard to have fair divisions of labor Davis, M. (1973) Intimate Relations. Free Press, New
typically negotiated mutual practical care that York.
did more to sustain their sense of intimacy than Duncombe, J. & Marsden, D. (1995) “Workaholics”
self-disclosure. As Vogler asserts, perhaps “not and “Whingeing Women”: Theorizing Intimacy and
Emotion Work – The Last Frontier of Gender
all intimacies are affairs of the self” (2000: 48; see
Inequality? Sociological Review 43: 150–69.
also Holland et al. 2003). This is not, however,
Giddens, A. (1992) The Transformation of Intimacy.
to deny the significance of “self-disclosing inti- Polity Press, Cambridge.
macy” in popular culture, or its discursive power Hochschild, A. (2003) The Commercialization of Inti-
to influence everyday perceptions of how to do mate Life: Notes from Home and Work. University of
intimacy. California Press, Berkeley.
Holland, J., Weeks, J., & Gillies, V. (2003) Families, Inti-
SEE ALSO: Couples Living Apart Together; Het- macy, and Social Capital. Social Policy and Society 2:
erosexuality; Inequalities in Marriage; Intimate 339–48.
Union Formation and Dissolution; Lesbian and Jamieson, L. (1998) Intimacy: Personal Relationships in
Gay Families; Love and Commitment; Marriage Modern Societies. Polity Press, Cambridge.
Jamieson, L. (1999) Intimacy Transformed: A Critical
Look at the Pure Relationship. Sociology 33: 477–94.
REFERENCES AND SUGGESTED Misztal, B. (2000) Informality: Social Theory and Con-
temporary Practice. Routledge, New York.
READINGS
Roseneil, S. & Budgeon, S. (2004) Cultures of Intimacy
and Care Beyond the Family: Personal Life and Social
Bauman, Z. (2003) Liquid Love: On the Frailty of Human Change in the Early Twenty-First Century. Current
Bonds. Polity Press, Cambridge. Sociology 52: 135–59.
Bellah, R. N., Madsen, R., Sullivan, W. M., Swidler, A., Sennett, R. (1998) The Corrosion of Character: The Per-
& Tipton, S. M. (1985) Habits of the Heart: Individu- sonal Consequences of Work in the New Capitalism.
alism and Commitment in American Life. University London, Norton.
of California Press, Berkeley. Vogler, C. (2000) Sex and Talk. In: Berlant, L. (Ed.),
Berlant, L. (1997) The Queen of America Goes to Wash- Intimacy. University of Chicago Press, Chicago, pp.
ington City: Essays on Sex and Citizenship. Duke Uni- 48–85.
versity Press, Durham, NC. Jamieson, L. (1998) Intimacy. Polity Press, Cambridge.